Slummies' net white elephant?

phoenix

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Slummies' next white elephant?

So I am a little weary of the constant [feels that that] marketing campaign I have been subjected to over the past few weeks and
am feeling cynical.

Hemingway's

I also have a 1.9Mb Hemingway's brochure [did the email rounds at work] in PDF format. Anyone who would like to have a look is welcome to pm me their email addy.

The following may happen:

It will start with a bang as many things do in these parts and people will flock to it for the first month or three before interest starts to wane.
Then the smaller shops will start to close as they can no longer afford the exhorbitant rent. This is appears to be happening at the plush new
Mdantsane Mall. Residents of said settlement would rather travel 10-15km in a taxi to shop at Vincent Park, it seems. :rolleyes: Hemingway's is being touted as an upmarket mall. I am not sure that East Londoners as a whole are as well-heeled as consumers in Cape Town, Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban or even Port Elizabeth. Also, we are still in a recession, or so I have heard. I find it strange that the roads connecting Hemingways to the rest of East London were not completed earlier:there is still work to be done on them. :rolleyes: [Then again, there may be a perfectly good reason for this.]

It will succeed beyond my wildest dreams and bring customers streaming in from the eastern half of the Eastern Cape to the detriment of other shopping centres in this region.People will lose jobs and shops will stand empty. <cough>King's Mall</cough>

After the novelty has worn off, sufficient people will continue to frequent the bigger, stronger shops at Hemingways for them to be viable while other shoppers drift back to more familiar haunts and easily accesible haunts. [As a pedestrian, Hemingways is out of my way and something of an awkward walk.] Fragile equilibrium sets in.

I am sure that there are other possible scenarios.
 
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Major tenants have already started to move to Hemingways from other smaller malls.

I don't think Hemingways will have a problem. The other malls will.
 
EL unfortunately just doesn't seem to have enough people to support a "mega" mall in this economic environment.
 
EL unfortunately just doesn't seem to have enough people to support a "mega" mall in this economic environment.

Hemingway's spin doctors are trying to present this as a regional mall,
but I have to agree with you, Lydon.

Building malls in Mdantsane and planning to do so in Beacon Bay and Gonubie as well was, in my opinion, a dubious decision at best, but then I
know precious little about the way business work or what goes on in boardrooms. Smaller, less extravagant shopping centres might have sufficed to cater to shoppers in those areas.

Once again developers in East London seem to have missed the boat.
I wonder whether anything will ever be done to clean up Marina Glen
and make something of it? /Reminisces about visits to Marina Glen back in the early 1980s./

I hear that a 5 star hotel has been built here too. I wonder how well that will do.

I am a miserable sod tonight, aren't I? ;)

A visit to Cape Town tends to do that. :p
 
Ah yes, must suck seeing how efficiently a real city works ;)

But don't worry, it's happening all over. Especially in Gauteng. They're building far too many malls/shopping centres than there is need for.

Once places are forced to close down, they'll start waking up. Until then...enjoy your new mall ;) Who knows, it could surprise everyone. Canal Walk over here is getting far more business than was predicted.
 
Canal Walk is pretty cool place to be. Somerset,Tygervalley, On Maine are very nice malls :)

I hope EL will support Hemingways, that place really needs a decent place to shop.
 
Canal Walk is just an epic fail architecturally. I'm so glad the rest of Century City for the most part looks more modern.

Indeed EL does need a great place to shop. So spend spend spend ya'll :p
 
I am unlikely to go there often if at all: I don't own a car or even know how to drive
so I would have to walk their. I am not certain whether the route to Hemingway's
is pedestrian friendly or how safe it would be to take myself there.

Doubt that I'll be buying any luxuries anywhere soon.
 
Well - Mtdanzane was bigger than Soweto - Area wise not too long ago. We have >1mil residents in EL - 400k in the city, 600k in the townships, or thereabouts.

Like PE, the larger area of EL is residential - however, we have a fairly small industrial zone.
We may have the numbers to be classified as a city, but we most certainly do not have the infrastructure for it.

The Absolute best thing about EL though, must be the way the N2 brushes past it without cutting into the city. I hate nothing more than driving on the N2 and have to snail pace everytime I hit a city. Knysna and Umtata can go screw itself.

It's also a much prettier city than just about every other place - due to all the natural rivers flowing through the city. Bar cape town - I dont think there's another place you can drive in and still enjoy the scenery as much.

I just hope this new mall will bring with it a new mentality on service delivery - as that concept appear to be non-existent in this town.
 
Maybe if the voters in the EC get their act together, something will happen :D

The fact that it's the poorest province in the country is just sad. So much opportunity. Especially as a coastal province.
 
Well - Mtdanzane was bigger than Soweto - Area wise not too long ago. We have >1mil residents in EL - 400k in the city, 600k in the townships, or thereabouts.

I had no idea it was that high:I must have ben looking at old figures. :o

It's also a much prettier city than just about every other place - due to all the natural rivers flowing through the city. Bar cape town - I dont think there's another place you can drive in and still enjoy the scenery as much.

Agreed! I live in a beautiful old suburb with trees on either side of the road. :)
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I just hope this new mall will bring with it a new mentality on service delivery - as that concept appear to be non-existent in this town.

So do I. I'm just not that hopeful.


Lydon do you have friends or family in East London or have you passed through it?
 
I took a walk up to Hemingway's Mall this morning and returned a short while ago.
It is somewhat bigger than Vincent Park and has 3 floors.
Around 85% of the shops are open.

As is the norm when a new shop, or in this instance, a shopping centre opens in East London, it was congested.

I almost got lost. Almost.

To my surprise, I did not see anyone I know there.

Exclusive Books has a coffee shop.

If I seem to be gushing, it is only because we are not used to this sort of thing in this One-Horse Town ;-)
 
Really ? A new mall congested on its opening day on a public holiday? Who woulda thought it :P
 
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